Glimpse
by Nubian Queen
Summary: A glimpse can sometimes be all it takes...
1. Chapter 1

_Ok, so like, I haven't been this inspired to write in awhile but I love, LOVE dealing with characters that have issues and this literally jumped from my brain at midnight and demanded to be written. Reviews and opinions are appreciated!_

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He first heard about her nearly a year before he met her, the Terra Novan spy who Mira had coerced into 'helping' them. It was a matter of little interest to him (except as a fleeting source of amusement in thinking the Great Commander could be hoodwinked by one his very own acolytes) who Mira got to get the job done. As long as she delivered on what he required, he didn't care.

He first saw her about seven months later. It was nearly dusk, a dangerous time to be about in the wooded areas of this hostile world. He had been making his way to the sixer camp, in need of some medical supplies after a nasty run-in with one of the less friendly indigenous species. While he knew he could make do without it, as harsh experience had taught him, he saw no need to add another rather gruesome scar to his already fulsome collection if it wasn't necessary. He slid quietly through the forest, almost like a predator himself. He was within half a click of the camp when he heard the faint rustle of something behind him. He froze for a moment, listening, then moved with catlike quickness up a tree. It was the best cover available from Slashers, which were the predominant predator in this particular area. As quietly as possible, he slid his sonic gun out of its holster and focused his attention on the oh-so-slight rustle of the bushes. He had been quite thoroughly surprised to see the slender figure that emerged and was just as quickly gone, headed in the same direction he had been. He slipped silently from the tree, gun in hand, and followed, discreetly of course.

She was very small, for it was a she, this creature who dared to brave the night terrors. He played with her a bit, slipping almost close enough to touch, and then fading away before she could see him. She definitely knew she was being tailed. He had expected panic, or frozen fear and, while she was obviously on edge and fearful, she never seemed to lose her cool...or her head.

He had to admire that.

Once, he slipped close enough to catch her scent. It was somewhat elusive, rather like the female herself, but it nearly stopped him in his tracks. He took a deep breath and held it, certain he would know her again just by that sweet, musky, utterly delicious feminine scent. He closed his eyes and took a moment to buss his forehead a few times (gently) against the nearest tree.

_Lucas, man, you've been hermiting it **way** too long if just the scent of a woman is having this effect on you._

He opened his eyes and continued to dog her footsteps until they reached the sixer camp.

Then, he waited.

The sixers all knew him by sight and, as well, knew better than to bother him when he made the rare appearance in their camp. They knew his routine, and that he would find Mira or Carter when he was good and ready, that usually being after a meal and a good washup. This time was no different. The eyes that took note of his entrance quickly turned in other directions as he made his silent way around the perimeter of the camp, his eyes fixed on the shadowy figure nearing one of the camp trees. He glided slowly nearer, was within just a couple meters when she turned near the base and was caught in the light of one of the many torches set about to give light and to keep predators at bay.

Once, when he was much younger, just a boy still really, his mother had taken him to a zoo, before the last of the non essential animal lifeforms had died out, and he had seen a real lion. It was a pair, lion and lioness, and, although he was sure they were probably quite the worse for wear, the lioness sat up upon her haunches and stared straight thru the glass. He had felt that stare, so proud and strangely sad, right down to his toes. It had caused his heart to jump, hard, and then beat so loudly he was sure his mother could hear it. He had been terrified, and enthralled and strangely in awe of the brilliant creature that held him captive in its gaze. In that moment he had wanted nothing more than to reach out and touch the magnificent creature before him, even though he was thoroughly aware of how potentially dangerous that could be.

He had that exact same feeling now.

Her delicate features were highlighted by the flickering movement of the flames, her hair dark and wavy and her eyes...

He was unable to determine their color but their color was unimportant because it was what was in them...oh, it was that that was the true, real draw. He could feel the pull of those eyes even across the distance that separated them.

He only held her gaze for the briefest of moments before she turned and was swiftly carried up into the trees but it was enough. Enough for him to know that he had to find out more. His eyes followed her up into the tree, making note of the one she was in, trying vainly to see the shadows that moved in the branches above. It was of little use, it was much too dark so he backed slowly away before finally turning and making his way toward his tent across from where she had disappeared. He was patient. Nothing, _nothing_ if not patient. He could wait.

###############

He ended up following her back to Terra Nova. He rationalized it as simply making sure Mira's chess piece didn't get taken out by a random predator but he was not so self delusional that he didn't know the real reason.

He couldn't bear the thought of something happening to her before he had a chance to approach her.

He almost did. She stopped, once, near Outpost Nine, and leaned up against the building's outer wall. He could see her turn her face up to the moon as she simply stood. He couldn't see much more than that, as the Outpost was in a clearing and necessitated his staying in the edge of the forest in order not to be seen, but it was her posture, her whole being really, that seemed to speak to him.

She seemed so, heartbreakingly, alone.

And if there was one feeling Lucas was intimately familiar with, it was the feeling of being utterly alone.

He was struck with such a powerful yearning to simply walk up to her, not necessarily to speak but just to be, and look up to the night sky and share space so that neither of them would be one, but two, and displace that lonely aloneness that radiated from her to him. He literally had to reach out and grab hold the nearest tree so as to keep himself in place.

She moved soon after that and less than 20 minutes later saw her shimmying deftly through an overgrown drainage ditch and back into the (relative) safety of Terra Nova. He watched from afar as her small figure grew smaller still as she navigated her way to wherever it was she called home. And when her figure finally melted into the darkness so to did he as he began to backtrack his way once again to the sixer camp.

The darkness moved and squawked and rustled but he had long since learned the dangers of the night and so moved with fluid and economic grace back the way he had came, determined that this would not be the last he saw of his little spy.


	2. Glimpse 2

It was obvious she wasn't used to company.

It took him a little time, not much, as he _did_ have other things to think about as well, but still, he found out why his little spy was a spy.

After all, everyone has there reasons.

He stood at the entrance to the crude treehut and observed her at first. She slept mostly, and coughed the rest of the time. A few discreet questions and he had his answers as to why.

Syncillic Fever.

He was rather amazed she was still alive as it tended to more often than not kill you quickly. He spared a brief moment of curiosity as to how it was Mira was keeping her alive before he returned to his perusal.

He chalked one up to sheer tenacity on the woman's part because to look at her, he couldn't really see why she would still be living. Lying there as she was, she rather resembled a corpse, with her pallor, sunken cheeks and eyes and skeleton-like thinness. He moved his eyes back up her body only to be caught in her gaze.

_Damn._

_"_Who are you," she rasped.

He shrugged casually, "No-one."

She offered a half-hearted smirk, "Well, it's not often I get company, even from no-one."

He smiled faintly at her attempt at humor.

She gestured weakly to the stool by her cot. "Don't suppose you'd care to sit?"

Unsure as to why exactly, he found himself sauntering slowly in. He casually hooked the stool with his foot and pulled it back a bit before seating himself.

She cocked an eyebrow at that. "Don't worry. I try to make it a point not to attack people upon first introduction."

He did laugh at that. It was sudden, abrupt and cut off quickly, a harsh bark of laughter from someone completely unused to such vocalizations.

She smiled at that and it seemed to momentarily transform her face into something approaching beauty.

He wondered if her daughter smiled in such a way as well.

###########

Deborah continued to smile at the strange man before her, who reminded her so very much, with his overly cautious movements, of a rescue pet she had owned long ago. It had taken her ages to get the poor, abused creature to trust her enough to come close enough to pet.

Turned out to be the best damn dog she'd ever owned.

For once, it was actually bright enough in her small hut to see quite clearly and she observed the young man in front of her.

Young, but old before his time, obviously carrying the weight of days without sleep and too much stress and something dark which seemed to haunt the depths of his eyes. She was fascinated by the clear green of his eyes. Such an unusual shade. They made her think of grass and the translucent green water of a small lake she and her husband had once visited, long ago.

She may have been ill, her body wasting away to practically nothing, but her mind was still sharp and she put those observation skills, which had made her such a good researcher, into play now. She studied him, and was faintly amused to note that he was studying her just as intently.

He watched the woman as she so obviously watched him in return and wondered what it was she saw when she looked at him.

"So," her voice interrupted his musing, "what would bring a young man to the door of such a specimen as myself? I must confess myself deeply curious about that because its not as if I get around much. Matter of fact, I'm not really sure if anyone besides Mira and her two henchman are even aware I'm here. I sure as hell haven't seen anyone besides them."

So, no mention of her daughter. Clever woman. Feel him out, see what he knows. He would do the exact same thing.

He shrugged as he leaned forward, clasping his hands and bracing his elbows on his knees. He offered her a disarming grin. "I think you'd be surprised at who all knows you're here."

She gave him a point for the answer that wasn't really an answer and tried again.

"Well, if you're trying to alleviate boredom, you didn't pick a very good option. You're looking right now at pretty much all I do, 24/7."

"Guess it's a good thing I'm not here cause I'm bored then."

It was her turn to laugh at the cheeky devil, a laugh which quickly turned into a deep, hacking cough. She managed to get it under control again only to note a tanned and scarred hand holding a cup of water out to her. She took it gratefully and drowned the rest of her cough with the sweet water. She handed it back and took note of the faint concern which flashed in his eyes and was quickly shuttered.

He sat back as she waved him off and closed her eyes, taking deep breaths, hating the airless agony that gripped her after a coughing spell. After a few minutes, she opened her eyes to see the man, still sitting on the stool, quietly watching.

She smiled, faintly.

"Thanks. For the water. It can be hard to reach, especially when I'm doubled up like that."

He frowned. "You should move it closer then."

"Well, I might consider that, if I could move my ass more than the little bit it takes to hang it over the slop bucket," she snapped sarcastically. Immediately, she closed her eyes and sighed.

"Wait. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have snapped like that. I just get...frustrated."

She heard a rustling thud and her eyes popped back open just in time to see him set the small table that had stood near, but not near enough, her bed, directly beside her head.

Plenty close enough to reach.

For some reason, that made her tear up. She gave him a true, real smile. "Thank you."

He seemed to almost squirm in his skin, like a small boy that just got kissed by a girl on the playground. His eyes shifted sideways as he muttered something and waved it aside like the kind gesture had been an annoying bug.

She got the feeling such gestures had been few and far between for him...which made her appreciate it all the more.

########

Lucas felt like a bug under a microscope as the woman's intense gaze fixed on him once again. The gratitude radiating from her a feeling he could never remember feeling before, not directed toward him. It made him uncomfortable and yet, at the same time, made something within his chest pull and ache with an acute desire and wish that he could do _more._

_Why was he still here again?_

In his discomfort he couldn't quite remember and he was just about to make a quick exit when she did something unexpected.

She reached out and took hold of his hand.

He looked down, momentarily struck dumb by the foreign sensation. He hadn't had someone do something like that in...he couldn't even remember how long it had been.

And then, suddenly, he did remember.

He remembered his mother's eyes, staring straight ahead, as the soldier held her by her long, beautiful hair and held a gun to her head. They were stood side by side, facing his father and he could hear the leader shouting to his dad to make his choice. He had felt her hand then, reach slowly over and grasp his, her thumb stroking gently over the back of his hand as if to tell him it would all be alright. But of course, it wasn't.

The next moment, he was jerked away and hauled kicking and screaming from his mother's side and the next moment...

He hadn't let anyone touch him since...not really...not like that.

He jolted hard out of the memory only to note the gentle and emaciated hand that held his now doing the exact same thing.

It was more than he could take. He jerked back clumsily, nearly falling of his seat before finding his footing and stumbling back against the wall.

###########

Deborah snapped up in the bed, as quickly as she was able, eyes wide with concern at the extreme reaction her simple gesture had caused.

She had caught a glimpse of his eyes just before he jerked away, wide and filled with so much pain and grief, it caused her gut to clench in visceral, primal sympathy.

What in Heaven's name had caused this boy so much hurt?

It made the mother in her stand up and come to attention, that deep-seated need to fix whatever had been injured and broken...a need than not even time, age or sickness could dampen.

She knew he was going to bolt before he even turned to the door. It was written all over his body, the need to escape whatever memories had been so brutally brought to the forefront.

She found she couldn't bear the thought of not seeing the young man again, couldn't bear the thought of him leaving her presence so obviously disturbed and hurting.

She called out as he turned to leave.

"Wait!"

She put ever bit of motherly authority she could scrape together into her voice. It had been awhile since she had used it, her Bucket being so very independent and her seeing her so rarely.

It was enough to make him pause.

_Good. That meant he wasn't too far gone to reach._

As cautiously as she would approach an injured animal, she asked gently, "You know, we never did really introduce ourselves. My name is Deborah."

With his back to her, he tensed like a bowstring before slumping resignedly and running a slightly trembling hand thru his hair. He grew very still for a moment before he turned to look back at her over his shoulder. Her heart spasmed in pain at the look in his eyes before he offered her a small, sad quirk of the lips.

"Lucas," was all he whispered before he moved quickly out the entryway.

Deborah felt a tear run down her cheek as she softly whispered, "Goodbye Lucas, I hope I see you again."


	3. Glimpse 3

_Ok, this chapter is going to be where the T rating starts coming into real play. Now, normally, I don't go in for writing language, HOWEVER...when dealing with certain characters, part of keeping them IC sometimes calls for me to step out of the comfort zone in order to truly see from their eyes. The Character is The Character and, as any writer knows, sometimes they jump in and take over in order to get their story heard._

_TRIGGER WARNING* There is brief graphic description of torture/rape. We are delving into Lucas' memories and there is some nasty &amp;$#% there, so be warned._

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She had given up nearly on ever seeing him again. After all, it had been nearly 3 weeks.

She was having a rough night. Sleep did not come easily, and when it did, it brought dreams. Broken dreams of fear and anxiety, fear for her Skye, her little Bucket, images of death and pain and her husband.

She awoke, abruptly, out of one such dream. She lay for a moment, trying to calm her heartrate and her breathing when, out of the shadows, a soft whisper of a question floated out into the dark.

"Who is Bucket?"

She jumped, startled again, and saw him move out of the shadows and into her range of sight. It was done so gracefully, thoughtlessly, that she had to wonder how much of his time was spent shifting between the shadows.

"Lucas," she croaked. Grimacing and clearing her throat, she tried again.

"Is that really you?"

He moved closer to her bed, close enough to slip onto the small stool, close enough for her to see the dark shadows that ringed his eyes.

"You know, sometimes I'm not real sure."

He had a strange aura about him. As if her were there but not there at the same time. As if perhaps he had left a part of himself still in the shadows he had just emerged from.

She longed to reach out to him but had learnt well her lesson from the last time.

Gentling her voice as much as she could, she asked him, "Care to talk about it?"

He had his arms wrapped about himself, as if cold, but Deborah would be willing to bet her threadbare and highly cherished blanket that he wasn't. He looked like a man on the edge of falling apart.

Trying to lure him out, she said, "You look as if you were having some trouble sleeping yourself."

He just closed his eyes and sighed, "Always."

"Bad dreams?"

He nodded his head in mute agreement and then they sat, quietly, in the dark, as the sounds of the night pulsed and played around them.

############

"So, are you going to answer my question?"

Startled at the sudden break in the quiet they had created, she looked at him questioningly.

"Bucket. Who is it?"

Deborah huffed a small laugh. Curious as a cat, this one.

"Bucket is...my daughter."

His brow furrowed slightly and he cocked his head at her, "And you named her Bucket?"

Deborah resisted the urge to full out laughter. She didn't want to start a coughing spell and she also had the feeling that Lucas, in the strange mood he seemed to be in, wouldn't take laughter at his question well.

So she just shook her head slightly. "No, no, that was just a nickname her father and I gave her when she was little."

She stopped at that and Lucas had to fight the urge to shake her for more information.

"So does she _have_ a real name?" he asked.

She raised an eyebrow at his slightly testy tone and decided to recklessly push her luck.

"Yes."

When, after a few beats, he realized that was all she was going to say, he nearly groaned aloud in frustration.

Although, as far as distractions from his troubling dreams went, this was working well.

It had been awhile since he had last been in the camp. He wasn't too sure, time seemed to slip away from him sometimes, especially when he was working.

After their first meeting, he had decided that he did not need to talk to the woman anymore. She was obviously not going to be a source of information about her daughter, to cautious and closemouthed to tell a stranger much. A fact he could, grudgingly, respect.

But useless for his purposes.

He refused to dwell on the painful, and awkward, manner in which they had parted.

But when he had awoken, as usual, from his godawful dreams, he had somehow, in the midst of his usual pattern of trying to walk it off, found himself walking here. He had stood in the shadows, watching her sleep for a bit, before sinking into his own thoughts once again.

Sometimes, when the dreams (memories?) were particularly disturbing he had trouble shaking them off. He would just about think they were gone and then, before he knew it, they were sinking their claws into him again.

_GOD, _what he wouldn't give for a good, full nights sleep.

He honestly couldn't remember the last one he'd had...but he had a feeling it was probably before Somalia.

He brought himself back to where he was at with a jerk to see her, _Deborah_, looking at him with equal parts concern and amusement.

He tried to pick up the thread of their conversation.

"Is that it? Just yes? Or do I have to jump thru some kind of motherly hoop to earn the knowledge of her name?"

He tried to make it seem teasing but could tell by the expression on her face that it must have fell quite short.

She frowned at him and them motioned him forward.

"Come here, Lucas, sit down."

Normally he would rebel at such a parental-like order but just then, with the ghosts of his past and his dreams still in his mind, he simply did as he was told.

She fixed him with a Look, which he could not meet. Instead, he dropped his eyes to her hands, which were twitching at her blanket.

"You know, it may be one of the oldest damn cliches around, but it really does help to talk about it."

He looked up, to see her regarding him frankly.

She smiled, that sweet smile that seemed to transmute her face into its former prettiness...

a smile that made him think so much and so hard and so painfully of the one his mother used to give him when she was particularly proud of him that he damn near choked on the sob that rose in his chest.

He managed to turn it into a strangled cough at the last minute but he was sure that he probably was fooling no one, least of all her.

Her eyes clouded with compassion and she whispered softly, "Oh, honey, I'm so sorry."

_WHY was this bothering him so? Why now? _

He squeezed his eyes shut, gasping for air, gasping to stay quiet, to not let loose the monster that raged inside his chest, threatening to tear him in two.

He didn't realize he'd slid off the stool to his knees, didn't realize he was rocking back and forth as he tried to contain the clawed creature made up of grief and anger and love and heartbreak and God alone knew what else that was trying to rip its way out.

############

Deborah gazed in horrified fascination at the man in front of her as he seemed to completely collapse in upon himself.

_What in God's name had happened to cause this?_

She knew next to nothing about him, however she got the feeling this was something he would kill to keep others from knowing about. Why he was having this reaction here, now, with her, she could not even fathom, but he was dangerously on edge. She could feel the aura of instability rolling off of him.

What should she do? What _could_ she do?

She bit her lip in indecision and then, her mind was made up for her.

############

The moments never came often, but when they did, they damn near crippled him. Moments when he became lost in his mind, in his memories, in flashbacks so real he felt as if he were being ripped apart. He had developed some few coping mechanisms for dealing with it.

Sometimes, they worked.

More often than not, he just suffered through it. There was no one to see, no one to care that Lucas Taylor, the psycho genius son of the Great Commander Taylor, was losing his fucking mind. He was usually quite successful at staving off such moments until he was alone, away from anything and anyone that might see. It was the only way to survive.

Here, the strong survived.

The weak got eaten.

His mind dragged him further in, down to the deep wells of memory and pain that he tried never to go near. His fingers tunneled unknowingly through his hair. Grasping and pulling as if to try and manually move his mind out of the danger zones.

_He didn't want to, didn't want to, oh GOD, he didn't want to see it again!_

But he couldn't stop.

He was watching, screaming, unable to look away from the bloody horror that was once his mother. Ears, hands, nose, breasts, hacked away like so much meat. Down on the ground as soldiers raped her brutally with their gunstocks. He had screamed til he was hoarse, no voice left, begging, pleading, sobbing til he threw up, dry heaving on the ground because he'd not eaten anything TO throw up since he and his mother had been kidnapped however long ago it had been it seemed like forever and still, still, they made him watch, yanked his hair til he thought he would have none left, didn't in some spots he had pulled and fought so vigorously not even feeling the pain of his own injuries anymore unable to hear his father's desperate screams for death and mercy _oh godohgodohgodpleasepleasePLEASEmake it stopstopSTOPdearFUCKING_ANYBODYkillherkillherpleasegod

He could hear her saying his name over and over and over again. He could hear himself keening in grief and agony. Even after the axe came down for the final time and he collapsed in a puddle sweat and blood and bile he could still hear her voice calling to him, soft and gentle.

He could swear he felt her hand on his head, his head on her shoulder just like when he was smaller and had hugged her.

He was too tall to do that now.

He could still hear her. Still feel her hand, still feel her shoulder. He needed to open his eyes, needed to know it wasn't real, _believe_ it wasn't real.

He cracked his eyes and began to shake with helpless, silent tears as his hopeless belief became reality.

####################

Deborah gathered what scraps of reserve strength she had left and levered herself to the very edge of her bed onto her side as the man in front of her began to keen in a rictus of grief the likes of which she had never before been privy to. She had seen her fair share of PTSD, she was, after all, a former active military wife, but this, this seemed to be something else. Moving as carefully as if she were trying to steal eggs from a Nikoraptor nest, she put her hand on his head. When he failed to lash out at her, she gently, slowly, pulled his straining, shaking, but unresisting form against her shoulder. She began to softly call his name, trying to help him come out of whatever waking nightmare state he had entered as she gently, and cautiously, began to stroke her hand over his disheveled head.

Slowly, ever so slowly, his keening ceased and he raised his head from her shoulder and opened his eyes. She watched as his face seemed to literally break with pain and he began to shake, weeping silent tears that broke her at last and she began to cry with him. Unable to understand, but incapable of maintaining her stalwartness in the face of his grief and pain.

A slight noise alerted her and she looked up, locking eyes with Mira who stood in the shadows of the doorway to the hut. Her dark eyes glistened in the faint light and she nodded, very slightly, before fading into the darkness of the night.

After a few moments, when it seemed as if he was regaining some slight control of himself, she swallowed back her tears and questions and decided to do her damnedest to offer him the only other thing she had to give.

A distraction.

"Once when Skye, my daughter, was little, oh, only about maybe 4,she had this pet. It was nothing more than a shoestring but she treated it like it was the most important thing in the world. Carried it around in a little plastic box and gave it bits of paper as 'food'," she giggled softly at the memory and gave a silent sigh an prayer of thanks when he lifted his head, eyes still swollen and bleary and seemed to give attention to her story. She continued on, watching discreetly as he rubbed, child-like, at his eyes and swiped his face on the bottom of his shirt and generally tried to restore his dignity.

She continued on, telling stories of her daughter, laughing and sighing by turns at the memories and feeling inordinately happy on the few occasions she managed to elicit a laugh from him as well.

It was late into the night, or early in the day, when she finally trickled off into silence. He had moved, at some point, so that his back was against the post of her bed. They sat silently for a moment, which stretched into two, before he raised his eyes to hers and, so softly she almost didn't hear it, said, "Thank you."

She grinned. "Thank _you _for taking the time to sit and reminisce with a sick, old woman about things I'm sure you've no interest in."

He gave her a small, lopsided grin, "Sick, yes. Old? Not a bit. And I've enjoyed all of your stories," he got a strange, wistful look on his face, "She sounds like quite a girl."

"That she is. Not so much the girl anymore, unfortunately though. Every time I see her, she seems more and more the woman," she stated fondly.

He murmured, so low she almost didn't catch it, "Yes, yes she most definitely is."

Her eyes sharpened, "Have you met Skye?"

He looked suddenly flustered, turning his eyes down and picking at nonexistent strings on his cargo pants.

"No, no, I've not met her."

Deborah was willing to bet her so-called 'bottom dollar' though that he'd definitely at least, _seen_ her. _And, judging from that 'classic' response, _she thought not a little sarcastically, _he obviously liked what he saw._

Deb wasn't too sure how she felt about the idea of the, clearly, troubled young man before her, casting his eyes at her daughter. He seemed nice enough but she really knew too little about him to be certain of that fact. Her features hardened somewhat as she determined that she would do her damnedest to find out all she could about him before long. As limited as her movement was, there was little she could do to actually prevent them from meeting one another, but she would do her best to make sure that, if he did, she would be aware of just _what_ exactly kind of man he was...

and if she needed to warn her daughter to be on guard.


	4. A Glimpse at the Falls

_Here it is. The next 'glimpse' of our story! Hope you enjoy and, if so, drop me a line and let me know!_

##############

Once he saw her out at Snakehead Falls.

It was his favorite place to go for displaying his work to taunt his father...that and he loved being near the water.

The water had been one of his favorite aspects of this world. It was everywhere, anytime you wanted it. In the future it was a precious commodity, certainly not wasted for things such as swimming or bathing and there were no areas like the waterfalls in nature anymore. The only place you could see something even remotely like it was on a holoscreen projection.

When he had first discovered this place it had seemed almost unreal to him, that anything could be so beautiful. He had spent an entire day exploring the area before finally working up the courage to actually step into the water. It was cold, the smooth rocks of the riverbed slipping and rolling beneath his feet. He had cautiously moved in deeper, teeth chattering from the cold, but totally unwilling to relinquish the amazing sensation of almost weightlessness that he was beginning to have. He had laughed aloud from sheer pleasure and determined then and there to figure out how to swim, wondering how anybody could _not_ want to experience this.

So when he emerged from the woods near the waters edge that day, he nearly fell right into the water in surprise when he almost tripped on a backpack set well away from the waters edge. He slipped back into the woods quickly, looking sharply around to see how many there were.

There was only one.

She swam very near the base of the falls, a happenstance for which he was grateful as it kept her from hearing his arrival and near fall over her equipment.

He backtracked to a spot a bit higher up the falls and settled down to watch and wait til she, whoever she was, left.

He was rather surprised that anyone from Terra Nova would be out here alone. One of the cardinal rules of the colony was never to go OTG unless at least in pairs.

Apparently the lady was a rulebreaker.

He grinned. He could totally respect that.

She flipped up and started lazily floating along the top of the water on her back. He was just slightly too far away to really see her face clearly, but her body...

He swallowed, hard, and forced himself to look away but the image seemed burned onto his retinas. She was small but perfectly curved in all the right places, the brief, white bikini she wore leaving little to the imagination.

That's when a thought struck him.

He circled around to get a better view and felt his heart slam in his chest when he realized it was _her._

The spy.

_His_ spy.

Even in daylight with her eyes closed and her hair unseeable and very little in the way of clothes (_and, dear God, he had to close his eyes at _that_ thought!), _he knew.

It had to be her.

A slight splashing alerted him and he opened his eyes to see her slowly making her way to the shore.

His mouth completely dried up as she emerged from the water like some kind of Greek nymph, all wet, sleek limbs and perfect skin. She was busy wringing the water from her hair and then flopped it back over her shoulders as she walked forward and retrieved a towel from a rock she had apparently placed it on earlier. He continued watching, feeling like an absolute voyeur as, instead of drying herself off, she climbed around to the big, flat rock near the edge of the falls and then bent over to lay her towel out over it before settling herself down in a prone position, evidently planning to let the sun do the drying for her.

He's totally unaware of how long he sits and just watches her as she drowses indolently in the sun, hair fluffing and kinking and curling as it slowly dried out.

He was pretty certain he could watch her forever.

She roused, briefly, just long enough to stretch (_and oh, the pictures he could paint with that in his mind!) _and roll over onto her stomach. He again watched, helpless within her spell, as she slowly reached back and undid the top to her bathing suit, flopping the ties to the side so that the smooth, soft expanse of her back was bared to the sun. The perfect sway and arch of her back to bottom to legs tantalizing him nearly beyond bearing.

He suddenly slammed his eyes shut and sunk back into the shadow of the woods.

He turned and furiously began marching away, uncaring of the amount of noise he made or anything else as his mind and his heart screamed at each other.

_Dammit Lucas! Think about something else! ANYTHING else! You can't have her and you KNOW that! She would NEVER want to be with you! Not if she knew!_

_Not if she knew._

His steps faltered slightly at that thought as his heart spasmed in pain. But it was an old pain, one he thought, at one time, that he had dealt with and laid to rest.

But apparently not.

Not when a vision in a white bikini floated before his mind's eye, hurting his heart and making him wish for things he had given up on long ago.


	5. A Glimpse of darkness

He came regularly now, every three or four days. Sometimes he would bring her things, just small things, a strange flower or a piece of fruit. Sometimes he would sit, quietly, obviously brooding over something (when she asked what he was brooding over, he told her it wasn't brooding, just deep thinking). She rolled her eyes at that , carefully where he couldn't see it, of course, because it was _such_ a man answer.

Sometimes he was cheerful and talkative. Smiling and asking her about her day and actually responding with a few details when she asked about his. He would even occasionally, laugh at something she said. She tried very hard to make him laugh. It was such an infectious sound and she knew, somewhere deep within, that it was something he did not do often, if ever...except with her.

He would talk about the things he saw, recognizing in her the need to, at least temporarily, transport herself somewhere besides her confining walls. It was a need he could thoroughly understand. After all, it was why he came here.

Sometimes, she could usually tell when, he came to hear her talk. Came for the distraction from whatever it was that lived in his head that tried so hard to break him apart. She never asked questions, recognizing his need to relieve the agitation of his brilliant mind.

And he was brilliant. That much she had been able to determine. One day he had arrived in her hut, talkative and exited as a child, barely able to contain himself as he paced back and forth and expounded upon the discovery he had made that was going to 'change everything' before he started spouting theorems and equations that she lost the ability to follow almost immediately. She kept up her front of happy gratification, too well-versed in the ways of motherhood not to understand when a child was seeking recognition and approval. She told him she was happy his work was progressing so well, that she was proud he had managed to do what he did, the usual spill of needed words from a parental figure (and if nothing else, she had figured out that that was her role for him) and watched as he nearly glowed from her words.

She often wondered why it was he was with the sixers. He didn't seem to be quite like them and yet, she didn't think he was part of Terra Nova either.

She had known so little of the sixers before becoming sick and arriving in their camp. They had come in on the Pilgrimage before theirs but very few people in the colony knew anything of them except that there was a major disagreement between Taylor and the sixers leader, Mira, and that, because of it, the sixers left.

It had been less than six months later that the Fever had swept thru the colony, killing so many and ending her up here, helplessly at their mercy for the medicine that was, barely, keeping her alive.

Sometimes she wondered if it had been worth it.

Once, only once, had he shown up and she knew, instantly, that something was very wrong. He had been livid. So, so angry that the strong aura of emotion, of hatred, seemed to roll off him in waves.

She was very still, like prey sensing a predator, very aware that this, this was a Lucas she had never encountered before.

She really wished she wasn't now.

His anger wasn't loud. Maybe it would have been easier if it were. No, it was quiet, seething.

And all the more dangerous because of it.

Deborah had seen alot of things in her life before ending up where she was at. Hell, she lived thru the Detroit Food Riots. She'd also been married to the military, so she was no stranger to danger and life threatening situations or angry people. But this...

She wasn't sure she recognized the man in front of her. Yes, it looked like Lucas, but something, something _fundamental_ seemed...off. Different. She couldn't quite put her finger on it but...

She didn't know what to say so erred on the side of sanity and kept her mouth firmly shut. She wondered if he even knew where he was at, as he prowled slowly back and forth in her small space, muttering to himself and rubbing his forefinger back and forth over the scar near his eye.

His attention snapped over to her so suddenly she flinched back in the bed as those intense, green orbs honed in on her like laser sights.

Two steps and he was by her side., in his eyes an expression she had never seen before in him...

but an expression she had seen many times before in another set of eyes.

It was that look in his eyes that first made her begin to wonder...

He swallowed once, hard, and reached out, grasping her freezing cold hand in his blazing hot one.

They quietly sat and stared at one another for what seemed like forever, she, afraid to break the silence, unsure of the reaction any action of hers would have on the strange, wild and unstable seeming man before her. It was some time before the steel hardness of his eyes began to give way to the more familiar expression, the one she had labeled as simply '_Lucas' _in her head.

It made her heave an internal sigh of relief as she saw what she could only term as some strange sort of madness, fade away as his eyes cleared into the eyes she was starting to know quite well.

He released her hand. Then he spoke.

"Tell me a story."

She blinked. Of all the things she had imagined coming out of his mouth just then, that was probably near rock bottom.

"Something...anything. I don't care. Just...talk," he pleaded, softly. "Tell me about...tell about Bucket."

Again disquieted by the strange desperation in his voice, she began to speak, telling him stories of her past, places she had visited with her husband, things she had done and seen as a child, aware that much of it had been gone by the time of his own youth. And interwoven within them, tales of her own baby's youth, her little Bucket. She knew that, although he seemed to enjoy everything she talked about, he always seemed to pay that much more attention when she began to speak about her daughter, always showed that slightest bit more interest when she was mentioned.

Like a child listening to stories of a favored book character, he seemed to totally engage whenever she came up.

It was like he thirsted for any mention of her. It was amusing...and somewhat unsettling. The mother within her taking note of this strange interest in her child and filing it away.

She always thought it strange that, as curious as he seemed to be about all things, he never asked why Skye had that nickname...and when he mentioned her, it was always _by_ that nickname.

When he finally left it was nearly dawn. To her, it always seemed to be the coldest part of the night. She shivered hard as he stood, finally releasing her hand and moving back, taking with him the substantial body heat he seemed to produce and opening the way for a chill breeze to hit her from the direction he had previously been blocking.

He frowned.

"Are you cold?"

She jerked a nod as she tried to pull the thin scraps of cloth she called blankets higher up around her.

"Always," she looked up and grinned at him, "however, with as effective a heater as yourself sitting by my side, I didn't notice how cool it had gotten. Honestly, Lucas, I don't know how you keep from melting in anything more than a T-shirt!"

He smiled softly back and she was suddenly struck with just how attractive he truly was. She was shocked to realize she had never seen a smile quite like that on his countenance before and how much it transformed his face.

Before she could say anything, he had shrugged off the jacket he was wearing and laid it over her, tucking the collar up near her neck. She nearly swooned in bliss from the residual heat that imbued the material. She hadn't felt that warm in ages...

But she couldn't.

"No, Lucas, you need this. I'll be fine," she tried to make it sound firmer, but realized what a half-hearted protest it sounded like.

He flashed her a quick grin as he slipped backwards toward the exit, hands raised as if warding her off. He chuckled softly.

"Now, you wouldn't want me to melt, would you," he flashed her another quick smile. "Don't worry, I'll get it next time I'm around." His smile dropped and then he said, "I'll see about getting you a better blanket as well."

"No, Lucas, you don't have to do that," she said.

He frowned and gave her strange, serious look.

"Yes, yes, I do."

Before she could say anything else, he disappeared into the dark.


	6. A Glimpse of Skye

_Now, a little bit of Skye...and her point of view._

##############

Each time she saw him, it was like she was seeing a different person. Each conversation a glimpse at a personality, but she couldn't seem to fit together the whole.

He was a walking dichotomy...and he terrified her.

She had never before had the experience of finding someone simultaneously attractive and repellant. She remembered the first time she saw him in her mother's hut. He had startled her, put her on edge, emerging from the dark as he had.

Skye didn't like surprises...and she sure as hell didn't like them appearing from nowhere.

She had instantly noted his tall, trim physique and disarming grin. He had a boyish sort of charm about him, which stood at odd counterpoint to the catlike way he moved. Something the female in her took instant note of and very much appreciated.

And then there were his eyes.

She might almost have smiled at him, almost relaxed her guard, especially when she found out he had provided the much needed blanket for her mom had it not been for the twin warnings of her mother's tightened grip on her hand and the strange mixture of hardness and intensity in his beautiful eyes.

And, for the record, she damn sure didn't think they resembled the commander's _at all_.

How could he look at her with such hunger and say such horrid things at the same time? How could he call her by her mother's pet name with such affection and leave her quaking in her boots, she could not understand.

And how it was she could still find him even the _least_ bit attractive in spite of it made her so sick to her stomach she could barely manage a short visit with her mother before getting out of the camp and being sick against the nearest tree.

###########

The second time she saw him, he looked a million miles away. And when he came back, she caught a glimpse of such pain in his eyes that it nearly took her breath, before he shuttered his emotions away again behind the blank facade.

She imagined stabbing him in the neck with the survival knife she always kept in her boot when he threatened her mother again...

And wondered how he could smell _so damned good _while living rough in the jungle.

She took a mental step back from that particular precipice as she instead tried to find out whatever she could about the enigma of a man that was currently in charge of her life.

And she really, _really _needed to find out what the _hell_ happened in August of 2138 that could make a man hate his father to the degree that Lucas Taylor hated his.

####################

The third time, she'd been _so _upset. She searched it well, but she could not find the data chip Mira said he had requested she bring. She _knew _she had grabbed it though. She was trying to figure a way to fess up and face the music, praying it wasn't her mother who would pay the price, when he nearly pounced her in the doorway.

His hands on her head and his breath in her face and never had Skye been that up close and personal with a man a couple of boys in the past yes but not a man because when you are spying for the enemy relationships is something you _don't do _and this was in_fucking_sane Lucas Taylor but _dear God_ he smelled so _good_ and she did _not_ need to think that about him cause he was either crazy or close to it and he had _threatened her mother..._

And then what he said registered in her stunned mind.

He had figured it out. How to make the time portal work both ways.

She just knew that could not be good.

And then, before she could really process that, he asked about her nickname.

Left field, thy name is Lucas.

She, somehow, managed to stutter out a semi-coherent explanation while he grinned that boyish and charming and completely deceptive grin.

And then he told her the plan.

Why he would do that, she could not even _begin_ to fathom. Did he think she would be impressed? Proud?

Could he possibly be so completely immoral that all those people, those _lives_, could mean nothing to him?

How could he hate his father that much?

There was something so totally off about that, she couldn't even comprehend.

How could she keep talking, keep questioning, when her entire being was damn near frozen in horror?

Maybe she was better suited to spying that she had thought.

And then, he was suddenly _there_ again, his hand on her neck and his face, so close and then, he's kissing me, _on the cheek,_ but not really more like on my temple near my ear and _how_ can a kiss that's not even on the lips be _that_ much of a turn-on and _oh my GOD_ how HOW could I possibly think _anything_ this insaniac does is remotely_ attractive_ much less hot...

And then, he's gone.

And I think I'm losing my mind.


	7. A Glimpse of Skye Part 2

A Glimpse of Skye Part 2

The next time I see him is through a haze of smoke and crossfire as the army he has with him is shelling the colony. Everyone is screaming and running and panicking and WHAT in the HELL good does that EVER DO! I make my way as carefully as I can toward the clinic, certain as sunrise that they will soon need all the help they can get and as I dart between buildings I see him there, on top of one of the lead tanks, just watching, arms across his chest, like its a damn sports match or something.

As I turn to continue, I see Adam Zion who's only, like, _nine, _near his mothers market stall and trying to pull his little sister, who, I think is even younger than Zoe Shannon, into cover and she won't move but just keeps screaming and crying and trying to reach something...

And then I see Claire, their mother, on the ground, blood covering her front and I think I might be sick but I take off running anyway right across the plaza towards those children because _damn_ no kid should have to watch their parent die I should know...

Then I'm there and she has no choice, I grab her up and spin around to find Adam and somehow, even across that distance, we lock eyes.

I wonder what it is he sees when he looks at me...because I'm damned if I can figure out what I see when I look at him.

And then Lt. Wash is walking out from the command post and he raises his hand and says something to the man in fatigues next to him on that tank all without breaking our stare contest and, within minutes, it is silent except for the continued sounds of crying and burning and I feel a small hand slip into mine and it breaks the spell.

I look down to see young Adam, looking even younger with his face dirt-smeared and bloody from a cut above his eye, holding my hand and asking if I can help his mom get up so she can go to the clinic.

It doesn't take a medic-in-training to see that she will never get up again.

And I want nothing more than to shoot Lucas Taylor from his perch like a howler from a tree for bringing this hell down on us.

But now is not the time for that.

So I turn, with kids in hand, to try and find a safe place for them in the craziness that was once home.

######################

He comes into the clinic with some guy's, who looks like he doesn't even know he's in the world, arm slung around his shoulder. The guy must be totally knocked out of it to be letting _him _help him...

Either that or he has no idea who he is.

Sometimes I have to remind myself that alot of Terra Novans don't even know Lucas _Taylor_ exists. It's not like the Commander made it common knowledge.

That I knew about him was only I think because Taylor needed to talk to someone, and the least threatening person he had available to speak with was me, his somewhat adopted kid who had no one to tell anyway. He only told me good stuff though, about how smart he'd been and taking him fishing and crap like that.

Never said a word about the crazy.

I couldn't help wondering if that came later.

I find myself really wishing I didn't know who he was either. Maybe then it would be easier to see him helping the guy in as just some guy helping another instead of me wondering what he was up to now.

I just continue stitching up the head wound Dr. Shannon sent my way, although I make sure to keep Lucas within my peripheral view. Never pays to lose sight of the enemy.

Taylor taught me that.

He comes up to me.

"I didn't know you were a doctor," he says,

"I'm not. Just a medic. An in training medic," I reply stonily.

He nods, biting his lip and looking down. He stands there a few more beats, shifting from foot to foot and I wonder why he doesn't just _leave already. _I finish stitching up the head and finish off, taping the gauze and helping him off the med bed into a chair so someone else can take his place.

When I turn back he's still there and I resist the urge to huff and stomp my foot in irritation. I have to remind myself, _you're damn near 20yrs old Skye, one month away. Too old for tantrums..._

_No matter how tempted you are._

So I sigh instead and ask, "Why are you still here?"

He looks up at me thru his lashes (_WHY is it guys always seemed to be blessed with the beautiful lashes)_

I don't know how he manages to look diffident and authoritative at the same time but he does it well. Maybe its something only crazy people can do.

"How are the children?"

_What tha? WHY would he even care?_

I think that must have actually came out of my mouth because he actually manages to look _offended _when he says, "You know, I may be alot of things, but I don't normally go in for child killing."

"Oh, and what? You just thought you'd start shooting tanks and _nobody would get hurt?" _

A muscle in his jaw began to twitch. "If Lt. Washington had just stood down as ordered instead of shooting _at us_, NONE of this would have happened," he gritted out.

Now I was really starting to get hot.

"What the hell else did you expect? You know what? NO! I know _exactly_ what you expected. What was it? 'And when my father fights, and he WILL fight, they'll burn Terra Nova to the ground, with or without the people in it.' I must say, I'm surprised as all hell you even _bothered _to ask for surrender before you just started firing! Why didn't you just light a damn match and dance around the flames!"

It was then I noticed how quite it had gotten. I stopped my tirade to see all the faces around us frozen in various expression ranging from apathy to shock to fear. I choked, turning my gaze back to Lucas only to note the burning fire that raged in his eyes, turning the spring green to dark emerald.

He reached out, grabbing my upper arm and propelling me out of the clinic while the patients and doctors parted before him like the Red Sea. Only Dr. Shannon stepped forward as if to speak on my behalf but whatever it was that was on his face prevented her from speaking.

It must have been truly something to cause the normally intrepid doctor to hold her tongue.

I was starting to think I may have really messed up.

He brought us to an abrupt halt on the outer edge of the safety lights outside the building. His eyes glittered as hard as diamonds in the moonlight.

His voice was low and biting.

"Listen to me. The ONLY reason ANY of you are STILL ALIVE, is because of me. I have done my DAMNEDEST to make sure there were as few casualties as possible. Why? Because I KNEW you wouldn't listen to me! I KNEW my _father _wouldn't take the necessary precautions for civilian protection and I KNEW that his little acolyte Washington would do EXACTLY what he told her to do and start a war that you all had NO CHANCE of winning. You may think I'm a complete asshole but I'm not that much of one. I didn't _want _anyone to die!"

A complete asshole, no. A fucking crazy one? Yes indeed.

A fact I had to remind myself of as my body seemed to take the initiative of getting turned on in his presence. All my angry hard breathing had done nothing but make me very aware of how damn good he _still _smelled, how his passionate anger made the heat roll off him in waves, ones I was very happy for as it was flippin cold and I'm practical enough to enjoy the heat while still being totally pissed.

And I couldn't deny that I really liked the way his green eyes sparked and sizzled in his anger.

Maybe I'm the crazy one.

Suddenly his eyes soften and his hand moves slowly up to my face, almost cupping my cheek but not quite. Instead, his thumb makes a slow sweep from cheekbone to temple and I can't help but shiver.

"I know I've done some hard things, but they were necessary, Bucket. If you knew what I knew, you'd understand that. I'm not a monster... and I really would like to know if they're OK."

It took me a moment to catch back up to where we were at, but when I did, I just closed my eyes and slumped against the wall in defeat a moment before I opened them and gave him a good glare before stating baldly,

"As good as any two kids could be who just watched their mother get killed in front of them."

To say I was shocked at the effect of my words would be an understatement. He jerked, hard, and his skin literally lost all color, like he'd just bled out in front of me. His hand moved from my face to his as he did that odd rubbing thing on his forehead as his eyes closed and his face twisted up into the most pained grimace.

"Oh, _God,_ I'm so...I'm so _sorry."_ he looked back at me. And the funny thing was I honestly felt like he really, truly _meant_ it.

He stepped back, away from me and, while I was relieved, I also had the strangest desire to want to step towards him, to help relieve the grief and pain I could see written in his eyes. Thing was, it was a pain I understood...because only those who have experienced it _can _understand.

And right then, I totally did.

"You saw your mother die, didn't you," I asked, not really needing to, since the answer to my question was written all over his face, if you knew how to look.

And I did, since I'd seen the same thing with my father.

He looked away, swallowed hard, a sharp nod the only answer I received before he turned and left me, standing in the shadows of the clinic walls, suddenly understanding a bit of Lucas Taylor that I really didn't want to.


End file.
